Stuff

I gave some thought to a clever subject line, but this is a post full of random scans which I’d meant to post before but never did. “Stuff” works just fine.

As a fan of hockey and a fan of doughnuts, I felt like I should own at least one card of Tim Horton. It works out well that this card shows him with the Rangers, which was my father’s team.
Just in case anybody things I’m being facetious, hockey player Tim Horton opened the doughnut shop which evolved into the Tim Hortons chain of today. Horton himself was a HOFer who played over 20 seaons, mainly with the Maple Leafs, and died in a car accident while still an active NHL player in 1974.

One of my many back-burnered projects is to complete the 1977-78 Topps Hockey set. In a failed attempt to kick-start the project, I picked up a couple of needed key cards, like this one of HOFer Guy Lafleur.

Here’s another one, the rookie card for goalie Mike Palmateer, who was a favorite of mine from his time with the Washington Capitals.

This card just makes me laugh… Not only because it’s a goofy photo of Bobby Bonilla…
…But it also reminds me of the episode of M*A*S*H where Charles was sitting for a portrait painted by Colonel Potter, but spent the entire session complaining. The kicker at the end was that finished portrait:

R.I.P, David Ogden Stiers.

I’ve never been a basketball fan… When I was a kid I did give it a good try; I wanted to like every team sport. In the end, I had a better appreciation of lacrosse (specifically the indoor one-and-done Long Island Tomahawks) than I ever did of basketball.

That doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate basketball cards. I’ve always really liked the design of the 1957-58 Topps Basketball set, but you know what? Even the commons from that set are budget-busting.

Then I discovered that Topps did a 50th Anniversary insert reprint in 2007, and I said “Hey, good enough for me!” …especially when I found some in a dime box. I picked up a couple of Hall-Of-Famers in Bill Russell…

…And Dolph Schayes, who played his entire career with the Syracuse Nationals/Philadelphia 76ers franchise.
I hadn’t even realized that the Syracuse Nats had become the Sixers until I did some quickie quickie research for this post. Guess I should’ve saved this card for a “Forgotten Franchises” post. Here’s the back of the Schayes card.

Update: These cards are way more than I’d realized; see comments for details.

I have to admit, there’s a small part of me that wishes that 2018 Topps Heritage had cards like this, even if they were just variations.

During the Olympics I saw a segment about the 1960 Gold-medal winning USA hockey team… They had some game footage, and I am always jarred by the sight of goalies who aren’t wearing a mask (like Gilles Gilbert here):
I was watching the footage thinking “Have you lost your mind? Go put a mask on RIGHT NOW, young man!”

I understand it was a different game then, but it still freaks me out a bit.

John Bednarski rookie card! Wooooo!
John Bednarski’s only card! Wooooo! I remember Bednarski’s name from when my Dad watched Rangers games on TV, but I couldn’t tell you anything about him other than he played for the Rangers.

It’s funny… I bought hockey cards in 1975 (more because they were cards than because of hockey), and I got into hockey cards for hockey reasons in 1977, but in the meantime I completely missed the 1976 set, which is kind of a shame because I think that “1976 Joe” would’ve really liked these cards.

After hockey, basketball and baseball, I feel like I should include some football. Here are two 1968 cards that I got cheap (25 cents each, I think) mainly because I like the 1968 design… it’s basically the 1957 basketball cards all over again, don’t care who’s on the card, just like the cards.

I could tell you about these players, but it would just be regurgitating Wikipedia. Look it up yerself, ya lazy bum!